Canadian Greens add FOSS to election platform

Thanks to a founding member of Free Geek Vancouver, the Green Party of Canada has quietly become the first major political party in Canada to make support for free and open source software (FOSS) part of its election platform. Like officials in the Green Party of England and Wales, deputy leader Adriane Carr sees the move as compatible with basic Green ideas, but IT consultant Neil Adair also points out the move serves the practical purpose of helping the party match the technical resources of more established parties.

At the same time, the party has come out in favor of net neutrality in its platform, although it is not specifically mentioned in the official policy statement.

Although founded in 1983, the Canadian Green party has been a serious contender in federal and provincial elections for less than a decade. So far, it has yet to win a seat, despite some near misses. However, with support hovering constantly around 12% in 2007, and dissatisfaction with the leading Liberal and Conservative parties likely to lead to the third successive minority government, the Greens are strongly positioned for their first breakthrough, and could become a key element in the balance of power.

Other Canadian political parties have FOSS interest groups, and the New Democratic Party included a pro-FOSS resolution in its convention in September 2006. However, the Greens are the first party to endorse FOSS as party policy.

According to Carr, the idea originated when Scott Nelson, a founder of Free Geek Vancouver who does IT in her office, "came to me and said, 'Do you have anything in your platform about open source and net neutrality?' We didn't, and he said, 'Well, you need to. It's really the leading edge, and it totally meshes with the philosophy of the Green Party.'"

People had raised the topic with Carr "for eons," she says, and her office had been using FOSS for some time, but Nelson's suggestion was the first time she had thought seriously about putting FOSS in party policy. Nelson drafted a proposed policy, which Carr took to the rest of the shadow cabinet -- the party leaders who create official policy. Last spring, in anticipation of an election that never came, the FOSS plank found its way into Vision Green, the official Green election platform.

The open source policy is remarkable more for its historicity than its detail or originality. Starting with a brief definition of FOSS, the FOSS section of Vision Green goes on to say that FOSS can increase Canada's competitiveness in IT. More specifically, it states that Green Members of Parliament will promote the use of FOSS "in all critical government IT systems" as well as throughout the education system.

The decision was made without consultation with other Green Parties around the world, Carr says, "Although I do know that open source and net neutrality are talked about among other Greens. It just fits with our policies."